Our 9-year-old son is an emerging reader. Sometimes he’s a reluctant reader, but that all depends on his mood. Recently we wrote about the Big Foot and Little Foot book series that is great for those emerging, reluctant readers. That series is great for those first through fourth graders that are comfortable reading chapter books with lots more words than pictures. If your reader is on the younger end of that scale we discovered a new series that’s more graphic novel oriented, but still has chapter elements for those pre-k through second graders. It’s Kitty and Dragon and is great for those readers who want lots of pictures, but need to learn the skill of following the story by reading it too.
Kitty and Dragon has three short stories that are loaded with color and have short, simple sentences. Each page only has a sentence or two, unless the sentences are really short-like three words long. These short sentences, combined with the fact that there are lots of sight and high-frequency words mean that younger readers will be able to sound them out, or will already know the words.
The book is illustrated by Gillian Reid whose art has a soft, cartoonish feel to it. The drawings cover a wide range of places where a fairy tale might take place, like the small village, dark cave, spooky swamp, and more. It’s written by Meika Hashimoto whose economy of words, combined with the illustrations will speak to ages 5 through 9.
Vintage moms and dads could relate to Kitty and Dragon as being The Odd Couple. Dragon is huge, messy, very kind, and perhaps a little aloof. Kitty is a fearless neat freak, snores, and is generally quite happy. Dragon never knew that he needed Kitty until she sauntered into his cave and now they’re the best of friends.
This book is a very simple read for our 9-year-old, but he loves reading it. He’s read the book a couple of times and when I politely point out that he’s read it before he simply tells me that he enjoys reading it. I know the limits of my dad card, so I back off at this point. For you, reading this, the point is that this is a book that he wants to read because he confidently knows all of the words. Each short story is about 18 pages long and has a beginning, middle, and end. The pictures carry more weight than the words, but this is an exercise in getting children to want to read, and that is certainly accomplished by Kitty and Dragon. Even though he’s nine he’s already asked when the next book comes out. If your kids are in the prime age for this series they’ll be asking that too, but probably more often, with spaghetti stains on their shirt and in that precocious way that early elementary kids speak.
Kitty and Dragon is by Meika Hashimoto with illustrations by Gillian Reid and available on Andrews McMeel Publishing.
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